Sensitive – by Jenn Granneman and Andre Sólo
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This book is written for what is called the “Highly Sensitive Person”, which makes it sound like a very rare snowflake condition, when in fact the diagnostic criteria (discussed early in the book) yield a population bell curve of 30:40:30, whereupon 30% are in the band of “high sensitivity”, 40% “normal sensitivity” and the remainder “low sensitivity”. You may note that “high” and “low” together outnumber “normal”, but statistics is like that.
So, if you’re one of the approximately one in three people who fall into the higher category, and/or you have a loved one who is in that category, then this book looks at the many advantages to a commonly stigmatized and (by cruel irony) criticized personality trait.
Those advantages range from personal life to work and even public life (yes, really), and can be grown, positively highlighted, used, and enjoyed.
In the category of criticism, the book does not usefully cover the benefit of psychological resilience. Resilience does not mean losing sensitivity, just, being able to also dry one’s tears and weather life’s slings and arrows when the world is harsher than one might like. But for the authors, they have stacked all their chips on “we must make the world a better place”. Which is a noble goal, if not always an immediately attainable one.
Bottom line: if you are more sensitive than average and would like to use that to benefit yourself and those around you, then this is the book for you!
Click here to check out Sensitive, and make the most of your strengths!
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What causes food cravings? And what can we do about them?
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Many of us try to eat more fruits and vegetables and less ultra-processed food. But why is sticking to your goals so hard?
High-fat, sugar-rich and salty foods are simply so enjoyable to eat. And it’s not just you – we’ve evolved that way. These foods activate the brain’s reward system because in the past they were rare.
Now, they’re all around us. In wealthy modern societies we are bombarded by advertising which intentionally reminds us about the sight, smell and taste of calorie-dense foods. And in response to these powerful cues, our brains respond just as they’re designed to, triggering an intense urge to eat them.
Here’s how food cravings work and what you can do if you find yourself hunting for sweet or salty foods.
Fascinadora/Shutterstock What causes cravings?
A food craving is an intense desire or urge to eat something, often focused on a particular food.
We are programmed to learn how good a food tastes and smells and where we can find it again, especially if it’s high in fat, sugar or salt.
Something that reminds us of enjoying a certain food, such as an eye-catching ad or delicious smell, can cause us to crave it.
Our brains learn to crave foods based on what we’ve enjoyed before. fon thachakul/Shutterstock The cue triggers a physical response, increasing saliva production and gastric activity. These responses are relatively automatic and difficult to control.
What else influences our choices?
While the effect of cues on our physical response is relatively automatic, what we do next is influenced by complex factors.
Whether or not you eat the food might depend on things like cost, whether it’s easily available, and if eating it would align with your health goals.But it’s usually hard to keep healthy eating in mind. This is because we tend to prioritise a more immediate reward, like the pleasure of eating, over one that’s delayed or abstract – including health goals that will make us feel good in the long term.
Stress can also make us eat more. When hungry, we choose larger portions, underestimate calories and find eating more rewarding.
Looking for something salty or sweet
So what if a cue prompts us to look for a certain food, but it’s not available?
Previous research suggested you would then look for anything that makes you feel good. So if you saw someone eating a doughnut but there were none around, you might eat chips or even drink alcohol.
But our new research has confirmed something you probably knew: it’s more specific than that.
If an ad for chips makes you look for food, it’s likely a slice of cake won’t cut it – you’ll be looking for something salty. Cues in our environment don’t just make us crave food generally, they prompt us to look for certain food “categories”, such as salty, sweet or creamy.
Food cues and mindless eating
Your eating history and genetics can also make it harder to suppress food cravings. But don’t beat yourself up – relying on willpower alone is hard for almost everyone.
Food cues are so powerful they can prompt us to seek out a certain food, even if we’re not overcome by a particularly strong urge to eat it. The effect is more intense if the food is easily available.
This helps explain why we can eat an entire large bag of chips that’s in front of us, even though our pleasure decreases as we eat. Sometimes we use finishing the packet as the signal to stop eating rather than hunger or desire.
Is there anything I can do to resist cravings?
We largely don’t have control over cues in our environment and the cravings they trigger. But there are some ways you can try and control the situations you make food choices in.
- Acknowledge your craving and think about a healthier way to satisfy it. For example, if you’re craving chips, could you have lightly-salted nuts instead? If you want something sweet, you could try fruit.
- Avoid shopping when you’re hungry, and make a list beforehand. Making the most of supermarket “click and collect” or delivery options can also help avoid ads and impulse buys in the aisle.
- At home, have fruit and vegetables easily available – and easy to see. Also have other nutrient dense, fibre-rich and unprocessed foods on hand such as nuts or plain yoghurt. If you can, remove high-fat, sugar-rich and salty foods from your environment.
- Make sure your goals for eating are SMART. This means they are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound.
- Be kind to yourself. Don’t beat yourself up if you eat something that doesn’t meet your health goals. Just keep on trying.
Gabrielle Weidemann, Associate Professor in Psychological Science, Western Sydney University and Justin Mahlberg, Research Fellow, Pyschology, Monash University
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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How To Leverage Attachment Theory In Your Relationship
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How To Leverage Attachment Theory In Your Relationship
Attachment theory has come to be seen in “kids nowadays”’ TikTok circles as almost a sort of astrology, but that’s not what it was intended for, and there’s really nothing esoteric about it.
What it can be, is a (fairly simple, but) powerful tool to understand about our relationships with each other.
To demystify it, let’s start with a little history…
Attachment theory was conceived by developmental psychologist Mary Ainsworth, and popularized as a theory bypsychiatrist John Bowlby. The two would later become research partners.
- Dr. Ainsworth’s initial work focused on children having different attachment styles when it came to their caregivers: secure, avoidant, or anxious.
- Later, she would add a fourth attachment style: disorganized, and then subdivisions, such as anxious-avoidant and dismissive-avoidant.
- Much later, the theory would be extended to attachments in (and between) adults.
What does it all mean?
To understand this, we must first talk about “The Strange Situation”.
“The Strange Situation” was an experiment conducted by Dr. Ainsworth, in which a child would be observed playing, while caregivers and strangers would periodically arrive and leave, recreating a natural environment of most children’s lives. Each child’s different reactions were recorded, especially noting:
- The child’s reaction (if any) to their caregiver’s departure
- The child’s reaction (if any) to the stranger’s presence
- The child’s reaction (if any) to their caregiver’s return
- The child’s behavior on play, specifically, how much or little the child explored and played with new toys
She observed different attachment styles, including:
- Secure: a securely attached child would play freely, using the caregiver as a secure base from which to explore. Will engage with the stranger when the caregiver is also present. May become upset when the caregiver leaves, and happy when they return.
- Avoidant: an avoidantly attached child will not explore much regardless of who is there; will not care much when the caregiver departs or returns.
- Anxious: an anxiously attached child may be clingy before separation, helplessly passive when the caregiver is absent, and difficult to comfort upon the caregiver’s return.
- Disorganized: a disorganizedly attached child may flit between the above types
These attachment styles were generally reflective of the parenting styles of the respective caregivers:
- If a caregiver was reliably present (physically and emotionally), the child would learn to expect that and feel secure about it.
- If a caregiver was absent a lot (physically and/or emotionally), the child would learn to give up on expecting a caregiver to give care.
- If a caregiver was unpredictable a lot in presence (physical and/or emotional), the child would become anxious and/or confused about whether the caregiver would give care.
What does this mean for us as adults?
As we learn when we are children, tends to go for us in life. We can change, but we usually don’t. And while we (usually) no longer rely on caregivers per se as adults, we do rely (or not!) on our partners, friends, and so forth. Let’s look at it in terms of partners:
- A securely attached adult will trust that their partner loves them and will be there for them if necessary. They may miss their partner when absent, but won’t be anxious about it and will look forward to their return.
- An avoidantly attached adult will not assume their partner’s love, and will feel their partner might let them down at any time. To protect themself, they may try to manage their own expectations, and strive always to keep their independence, to make sure that if the worst happens, they’ll still be ok by themself.
- An anxiously attached adult will tend towards clinginess, and try to keep their partner’s attention and commitment by any means necessary.
Which means…
- When both partners have secure attachment styles, most things go swimmingly, and indeed, securely attached partners most often end up with each other.
- A very common pairing, however, is one anxious partner dating one avoidant partner. This happens because the avoidant partner looks like a tower of strength, which the anxious partner needs. The anxious partner’s clinginess can also help the avoidant partner feel better about themself (bearing in mind, the avoidant partner almost certainly grew up feeling deeply unwanted).
- Anxious-anxious pairings happen less because anxiously attached people don’t tend to be attracted to people who are in the same boat.
- Avoidant-avoidant pairings happen least of all, because avoidantly attached people having nothing to bind them together. Iff they even get together in the first place, then later when trouble hits, one will propose breaking up, and the other will say “ok, bye”.
This is fascinating, but is there a practical use for this knowledge?
Yes! Understanding our own attachment styles, and those around us, helps us understand why we/they act a certain way, and realize what relational need is or isn’t being met, and react accordingly.
That sometimes, an anxiously attached person just needs some reassurance:
- “I love you”
- “I miss you”
- “I look forward to seeing you later”
That sometimes, an avoidantly attached person needs exactly the right amount of space:
- Give them too little space, and they will feel their independence slipping, and yearn to break free
- Give them too much space, and oops, they’re gone now
Maybe you’re reading that and thinking “won’t that make their anxious partner anxious?” and yes, yes it will. That’s why the avoidant partner needs to skip back up and remember to do the reassurance.
It helps also when either partner is going to be away (physically or emotionally! This counts the same for if a partner will just be preoccupied for a while), that they parameter that, for example:
- Not: “Don’t worry, I just need some space for now, that’s all” (à la “I am just going outside and may be some time“)
- But: “I need to be undisturbed for a bit, but let’s schedule some me-and-you-time for [specific scheduled time]”.
Want to learn more about addressing attachment issues?
Psychology Today: Ten Ways to Heal Your Attachment Issues
You also might enjoy such articles such as:
- Nurturing secure attachment: building healthy relationships
- Why anxious and avoidant often attracted each other
- How to help an insecurely attached partner feel loved
- How to cope with a dismissive-avoidant partner
Lastly, to end on a light note…
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What does it mean to be transgender?
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Transgender media coverage has surged in recent years for a wide range of reasons. While there are more transgender television characters than ever before, hundreds of bills are targeting transgender people’s access to medical care, sports teams, gender-specific public spaces, and other institutions.
Despite the increase in conversation about the transgender community, public confusion around transgender identity remains.
Read on to learn more about what it means to be transgender and understand challenges transgender people may face.
What does it mean to be transgender?
Transgender—or “trans”—is an umbrella term for people whose gender identity or gender expression does not conform to their sex assigned at birth. People can discover they are trans at any age.
Gender identity refers to a person’s inner sense of being a woman, a man, neither, both, or something else entirely. Trans people who don’t feel like women or men might describe themselves as nonbinary, agender, genderqueer, or two-spirit, among other terms.
Gender expression describes the way a person communicates their gender through their appearance—such as their clothing or hairstyle—and behavior.
A person whose gender expression doesn’t conform to the expectations of their assigned sex may not identify as trans. The only way to know for sure if someone is trans is if they tell you.
Cisgender—or “cis”—describes people whose gender identities match the sex they were assigned at birth.
How long have transgender people existed?
Being trans isn’t new. Although the word “transgender” only dates back to the 1960s, people whose identities defy traditional gender expectations have existed across cultures throughout recorded history.
How many people are transgender?
A 2022 Williams Institute study estimates that 1.6 million people over the age of 13 identify as transgender in the United States.
Is being transgender a mental health condition?
No. Conveying and communicating about your gender in a way that feels authentic to you is a normal and necessary part of self-expression.
Social and legal stigma, bullying, discrimination, harassment, negative media messages, and barriers to gender-affirming medical care can cause psychological distress for trans people. This is especially true for trans people of color, who face significantly higher rates of violence, poverty, housing instability, and incarceration—but trans identity itself is not a mental health condition.
What is gender dysphoria?
Gender dysphoria describes a feeling of unease that some trans people experience when their perceived gender doesn’t match their gender identity, or their internal sense of gender. A 2021 study of trans adults pursuing gender-affirming medical care found that most participants started experiencing gender dysphoria by the time they were 7.
When trans people don’t receive the support they need to manage gender dysphoria, they may experience depression, anxiety, social isolation, suicidal ideation, substance use disorder, eating disorders, and self-injury.
How do trans people manage gender dysphoria?
Every trans person’s experience with gender dysphoria is unique. Some trans people may alleviate dysphoria by wearing gender-affirming clothing or by asking others to refer to them by a new name and use pronouns that accurately reflect their gender identity. The 2022 U.S. Trans Survey found that nearly all trans participants who lived as a different gender than the sex they were assigned at birth reported that they were more satisfied with their lives.
Some trans people may also manage dysphoria by pursuing medical transition, which may involve taking hormones and getting gender-affirming surgery.
Access to gender-affirming medical care has been shown to reduce the risk of depression and suicide among trans youth and adults.
To learn more about the trans community, visit resources from the National Center for Transgender Equality, the Trevor Project, PFLAG, and Planned Parenthood.
If you or anyone you know is considering suicide or self-harm or is anxious, depressed, upset, or needs to talk, call the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 or text the Crisis Text Line at 741-741. For international resources, here is a good place to begin.
This article first appeared on Public Good News and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
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This Book May Save Your Life – by Dr. Karan Rajan
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The title is a bold sell, but the book does include a lot of information about what can go wrong in your body, and how those things can be avoided.
What it’s not: a reiteration of Dr. Michael Greger’s “How Not To Die“. It’s not dense medical information, and it doesn’t cite papers at a rate of ten per page.
What it is: an easy-reading tour guide of the human body and its many quirks and foibles, and how we can leverage those to our benefit. On which note…
Hopefully, your insides will never see the light of day, but this author is a general surgeon and as such, is an experienced and well-qualified tour guide. Here, we learn about everything from the long and interesting journey through our gut, to the unique anatomical features and liabilities of the brain. From the bizarre oddities of the genitals, to things most people don’t know about the process of death.
The style of the book is very casual, with lots of short sections (almost mini chapters-within-chapters, really) making for very light reading—and certainly enjoyable reading too, unless you are inclined to squeamishness.
Bottom line: in honesty, the book is more informative than it is instructional, though it does contain the promised health tips too. With that in mind, it’s a very enjoyable and educational read, and we do recommend it.
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Yoga that Helps You on the Loo
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How This Video Helps You Poo
When you’re feeling a bit bloated, Yoga With Bird’s 10-minute yoga routine promises to help you release…your gas. And, perhaps, more.
From a tabletop flow to soothing twists, each pose allows you to sync your breath with movement, helping to promote organic relief.
With options to modify with pillows for extra support, this video (below) caters to everyone needing a digestive reset.
Other Toilet Tricks
If yoga isn’t your thing, or you’re interested in trying to use different methods to make your visits to the bathroom a bit easier, we’ve spoken about the ways to manage gut health, and use of probiotics or fiber, and even the prevention of hemorrhoids.
Namaste and goodbye to bloat!
How was the video? If you’ve discovered any great videos yourself that you’d like to share with fellow 10almonds readers, then please do email them to us!
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How to Eat (And Still Lose Weight) – by Dr. Andrew Jenkinson
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You may be wondering: what diet is he recommending?
The answer is: some guiding principles aside…. He’s not recommending a diet, per se.
What this book does instead is outline why we eat too much ← link is to where we previously had this author as a spotlight featured expert on this topic! Check it out!
He goes into a lot more detail than we ever could have in our little article, though, and this book is one of those where the reader may feel as though we have had a few classes at medical school. The style, however, is very comprehensible and accessible; there’s no obfuscating jargon here.
Once we understand the signalling that goes on in terms of hunger/satiety, and the signalling that goes on in terms of fat storage/metabolism, we can simply choose to not give our bodies the wrong signals. Yes, it’s really that simple. It feels quite like a cheat code!
Bottom line: if you’d like a better understanding of what regulates our body’s “set point” in weight/adiposity, and what can change it (for better or for worse), then this is the book for you.
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